


Days to Come

by xenoamorist



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Female Character In Command, Female Protagonist, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-13
Updated: 2011-12-13
Packaged: 2017-10-28 07:50:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/305572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xenoamorist/pseuds/xenoamorist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's John—killed by a ravenous monster in the night—who dies instead of Mary, and when she almost loses Dean the same way a year later, Mary's faced with the choice of whether to shelter her boys or to tell them the truth.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Days to Come

**Author's Note:**

> **Challenge:** [comment_fic](http://comment-fic.livejournal.com/profile)/[gabriel4sam](http://gabriel4sam.livejournal.com/profile), it was John who died, and Mary who took the road with the boys.
> 
> Very much unbetaed and written spur-of-the-moment at like 3AM. But I'm definitely interested in this idea, and this may possibly be read as a prequel to a longer work.
> 
> Mirrored on Livejournal: <http://momentane.livejournal.com/7763.html>

Dean is fourteen and Sam is ten when John dies.

The funeral is quiet, somber. Mary doesn't speak, doesn't say a single thing throughout the whole service, not even when the priest asks if anyone would like to offer a eulogy. Instead, she only stares at the headstone—John Winchester, beloved husband, adored father; April 22, 1954–October 13, 1993—with her mouth set in a straight line, her eyes (never wavering) blinking away the tears. Her fingers curl over her soundless lips.

It's the first time Sam and Dean have seen their mother cry. Sam wants to reach up, pat his mother on her arm the way she always strokes his arm when he's upset, but there's a chill radiating from her that's so fiercely cold it almost knocks him back. So his hand lies at his side, motionless except for the twitch of his fingers craving a touch, if not for her comfort, then for his.

And Dean, always so in tune with Sammy (his eyes sparkling with wonder when he'd placed his tiny hand on Mary's belly, his giggle so bright when he'd felt Sammy kick against him), places a hand on Sam's shoulder as he swallows the lump rising in his throat and wills himself not to cry, because his dad always told him that big boys don't cry, and keeping his eyes dry is the least he can do here.

After the service is over, Mary lifts her eyes and they meet Samuel's. He's standing ten, fifteen feet away with Deanna and the one or two other Campbells who decided to show up. Deanna's gaze is soft, sympathetic, but Samuel's—his gaze is harsh, blunt. His eyes break away from hers and travel, lingering on Dean's face, and then on Sammy's, before flicking back up to meet Mary's again. A few strides and then he's beside Mary, and he leans in, but is careful not to brush against her—not touching, never touching—as he murmurs in her ear.

"They have to know."

Mary stares at him, her gaze hard, burning with fury and a sudden hatred for those four words. The space between them is tense, heavy; Samuel's face is stern, his gaze steady. Mary parts her lips as if to speak, her cheeks stained with tears, but no words come out—not even a breath—and then in one movement, she turns away from him, places a firm hand on each of Sam and Dean's shoulders, and leads them away from the graveyard.

They walk home. John is buried in the church's graveyard, just a few blocks from their house, and, in the end, that's what drives Mary to leave—he's too close still, even when he's gone, and he's tied to this place, tied to this neighborhood, tied to every breeze that rustles the leaves and tied to every ring of the belltower.

Sam and Dean don't question it when, weeks later, Mary finally breaks her silence and tells them to pack their things. They're comforted, almost—comforted that the gravity weighing down the air for the past few weeks is finally lifting, comforted that they don't have to speak in hushed voices anymore—but they're still kids, after all, and saying good-bye to their friends and teachers is hard. And packing is hard. And leaving behind the ice cream shop with half-price cones on Tuesdays and the comic book store with the cats and the park they visit on Saturdays and Sundays just to kick around a ball is hard.

But they do it, because Mom said so, and Dean's old enough to see when Mary's hurting and old enough to trust her judgment.

They load their things into the back of a U-Haul truck by that Friday and toss their duffel bags into the Impala's trunk.

By nightfall, they're in another state.

At first Dean thinks it's strange to see his mom behind the wheel of the Impala—she looks out-of-place, almost, her hair too golden, the lines of her body too soft, her hands small as they grip the wheel—but over time it becomes normal, and the sight of his dad behind the wheel becomes a faint memory: a few harsh lines, and the smell of a leather jacket.

❧

  
They don't really talk about what happened that day. Sammy asks Dean sometimes, when the lights in their room are off and they're snuggled under the covers as they drift off to sleep, but Dean hushes Sammy and tells him that they have to be up early for school tomorrow, so shut your eyes and go to sleep already.

But even after Sammy's breaths steady and deepen, Dean's still staring at the ceiling, at the tiny glow-in-the-dark stars that Mary stuck up there one day when she was in a good mood.

They were both there the night their dad died though, and no matter how much Dean tries to come up with some other theory, some other explanation, the truth of the matter is—his dad didn't die like normal people died. His classmate Aaron's dad died last year, but it was a heart attack, and Dean would've been able to accept that. Not happily, but begrudgingly. And it would've been okay, maybe.

It would've been better than this, at least.

They don't talk about their dad yelling, about that note of pure fear in his voice; they don't about the sound of clothes tearing and the sound of floorboards being ripped up. They don't talk about the blood—Mary hadn't let them go down the hall, had shut the door before they could look inside, but they could _smell_ it, the stench of iron hanging in the air.

And most of all, they don't talk about the growls.

Dean gulps and gets up—hangs his head over his bed as he peers underneath, his heart pounding; and then he hops onto the floor and gets on his hands and knees and presses his cheek to the ground, checks to see if there's anything under Sammy's bed—and only when he's sure that there's nothing there does he get back under the covers. The closet doors are firmly shut. The windows are locked. And the tiny angel figurine is there on the shelf across from them, unharmed from the move because Mary had insisted on packing it in five layers of bubble wrap.

 _Angels are watching over you, Dean._

He shuts his eyes and lets his shoulders relax, and he drifts off into sleep. He dreams, but doesn't remember them when he wakes up with a feeling of dread uncoiling in the pit of his stomach.

❧

  
A couple weeks later, Mary is out getting groceries and Sammy and Dean have a list of chores to get through.

One—Do the dishes. Dean loses a game of rock-paper-scissors and has to do the washing; he scrubs away last night's spaghetti dinner (and misses a couple of spots while he's at it), and Sammy dries the dishes and places them in the cupboards; when they're done, Dean flicks the water from his hands at Sammy's face, and Sammy smacks him with the towel.

Two—Make their beds. Dean's bedspread is a little crooked and sort of uneven, while Sammy's is perfect. He even tucked his sheets under the mattress first. Dean looks from his bed to Sammy's and then feels a little embarrassed, maybe a little incompetent, but then he has Sammy in a headlock and they're wrestling on the ground, and it doesn't really matter in the end that Sammy's better at making the bed.

Three—Take out the trash. Another game of rock-paper-scissors, and this time Sammy's the loser. He hauls out the bag of trash and is back in a couple of minutes; he insists on washing his hands before they continue, and Dean replaces the trash bag with a new one while Sammy does that.

Four—Sweep the floor. Sammy takes upstairs, and Dean takes downstairs. Dean handles the broom a little clumsily, but within a few minutes, he has a sizeable pile of dust at his feet. He curses under his breath when he realizes that he's left the dustpan in the supplies closet, and by now he's getting tired and his stomach's grumbling. He cranes his head and makes sure Sammy's not behind him—Sammy would insist on Dean doing it the right way—and when he's sure Sammy's not around, Dean nudges the pile of dust over to the rug in the middle of the living room. He lifts the edge and starts to sweep the pile of dust under it—

—and then he freezes. There's something spray-painted on the ground: a circle of some sort, filled with symbols and with writing in some language he doesn't understand around it. Something about it feels menacing, doesn't feel right, and he doesn't understand the feeling creeping up his spine. Looking at this makes him feel sick for some reason—and guilty, as if he's stumbled upon something he wasn't supposed to.

At that moment, the front door opens, and Mary walks in with a bag of groceries hanging off of each arm.

"I hope you're done with your chores—"

And then the smile on her face drops when her eyes land on Dean kneeling with the edge of the rug still in his hand; he drops the rug, but it's too late. Mary's face is stern, her eyes wide, and there's a fierceness radiating from her that scares Dean. Their eyes lock for what feels like an hour and Dean feels like he's choking, drowning in his mother's disapproval, and he just wants to say he's sorry for whatever he's done, but Mary's look is so grave that his voice seems useless, and he feels like he shouldn't even acknowledge what he's seen, should just—should just pretend this never happened.

He stumbles over his feet in his hurry to get up.

"I, uh—" he says, then quickly sweeps a couple more strokes across the ground as he pushes his pile of dust into a neater pyramid. "Finishing up," he says before running over to the supplies closet and pulling out the dustpan. His head feels light, and the image of those symbols is burned into the back of his mind. And the way his mom looked at him—that thing wasn't a mistake.

Sammy comes slowly and deliberately down the stairs so he doesn't let a single speck of dust in his dustpan go astray. He goes into the kitchen and dumps the dust into the trash can, then turns. Mary's face has softened, and a small smile touches her lips when Sammy runs up to her and hugs her.

Dinner that night seems a little tenser, a little more quiet. But Sammy's still smiling as he tells Mary about his day at school, and Mary still laughs at Dean's quips, so maybe Dean's just imagining that tenseness and the hardness around Mary's eyes.

❧

  
They live this life—a normal life, and after a few months in this routine, Mary even starts making apple pie again—for almost a year and a half before it's shattered and everything comes crashing down again.

It happens right after Mary tucks the boys in, and she insists on doing it even if Dean tells her that he's getting too old for it (but secretly—and she can probably sense this—he's happy to see her every night, and he smiles after Mary leaves, her kiss still warm on his cheek). It's summer and it's hot, and after struggling to find a comfortable position under the covers, Dean finally gets up and cracks the window open. Mary's always told him to shut the windows, to double- and triple-check that they're locked, but Dean's shirt is sticking to him with sweat, and they're on the second floor anyway; there can't be any harm in leaving the window open a crack.

He's barely under the covers again when something scrabbles at the walls, and he sits bolt-upright just in time to see _something_ crash in through the window. Bits of glass litter the ground and whatever it is is _snarling_ , eyes angry, teeth long and shining with spit.

Sammy's eyes snapped open the instant he heard the crash, and he sits up too and stares, quivering, as he clings to his blanket.

"Dean—what—"

And Dean wants to say something to comfort Sammy, wants to tell him to shut up and go back to sleep, except he _can't_ because he's seized by fear, paralyzed, rooted to the spot, and then the thing has its claws out and it reaches out and swipes at Dean, slashes, cuts his cheek, digs into his chest, and Dean's screaming and Sammy's crying and _Mom, Mom_ —

The door bursts open and Mary's standing there, her body small but still intimidating when it's framed by the door and when the light in the hallway makes her a silhouette, poised and ready with a shotgun slung over her shoulder as she stares the thing down; she doesn't blink, and she draws a different gun from her belt, takes careful aim, and shoots the thing dead. It goes down with a whine.

When her eyes glance down and she's sure that the thing is still, her composure breaks and she rushes over to Dean, tears in her eyes as she takes in the bleeding cuts, the slashes, and she hugs Dean close, and blood blossoms over her white nightgown. Sammy's still quaking in the next bed over, and Mary pulls Dean away and assesses his wounds—Dean's head lolls, but he's conscious, he's alive; he's just in pain.

Minutes later, the ambulance howls up to their house, and Dean's loaded into a stretcher; Mary keeps the door to their room firmly shut, and she tells the paramedics that it was their family dog; who would've thought that sweet little Bessie would have it in her? And the gashes are a little too deep, a little too long, but the paramedics accept the story because it's what makes the most sense even when the evidence doesn't.

Sammy's quiet for the whole ride and Dean doesn't say anything either; Mary's face is filled with concern, her brow furrowed, tears in her eyes. She has her hands clasped before her lips, has her fingers butted up against the bottom of her nose, and then she shifts so that her chin is on her hands.

It's midnight by the time the doctors finish with Dean. Mary sends a prayer up to God, up to the angels watching over them, and thanks them that the wounds aren't too deep, aren't too severe, that Dean only needed a handful of stitches.

He's a tough boy and he's stabilized enough to be released after they're done. Mary's tense the whole drive home, but when they walk into the house again, Mary, in a fit of anger, rips up the rug and tosses it aside, revealing the full circle. There's a pentagram inscribed inside the circle, and Sammy and Dean stare at it as Mary paces and runs a hand through her hair.

"Devil's trap can't do jack shit against a werewolf," she says.

And then that front she's put up breaks and she collapses into the living room couch, her face buried in her hands; her whole body shakes with the force of sobs, and the sound of it fills the living room, so raw and hurt and they've never seen their mother so utterly _vulnerable_ , and it breaks something inside them, too. She shakes her head no, the heels of her hands digging into her eyes, and then she looks up, her hair in a disarray, her face pained, the tip of her nose red, her mouth twisted in despair.

"I never wanted this life for you," she says, her voice soft. "I would give anything— _anything_ —to keep this from you. But I can't—I can't leave you defenseless."

She tucks them into her bed that night, and her tears wet their faces when she kisses their cheeks. She leaves the door open and keeps the door to their room tightly shut. Sam can't sleep, and pain still shoots through Dean's whole body, so he can't sleep either—they spend the night with their sides pressed together and with the unspoken acknowledgement that something's changed, that something big is coming. They don't fall asleep until the edges of the sky turn a rosy pink.

Mary doesn't sleep at all, and by the time the boys come downstairs the next morning, their eyes bleary, Mary has everything packed up, and there's dirt on her clothes and a patch of ground in the garden with freshly overturned soil. Their room's been scrubbed clean, but there's still a dark stain on Dean's bedspread and on the ground; she tells them to take only what they need and to leave the rest.

Sammy packs a couple of his favorite books, and Dean packs his CD player and a couple of his favorite albums. (And when Sammy's not looking, Dean also packs his beanie baby moose, a present from Mary that he keeps tucked under his pillow when he sleeps.) Mary's already packed the angel figurine.

They learn about rock salt that day, about iron and sulfur, about devil's traps and about monsters and demons and hunting. Mary, swallowing away her tears, shows Sammy how to handle a gun, but she only lets Dean watch and doesn't let him actually handle a gun until his wounds have healed.

It'd be cool—this hunting business, a teenage boy's badass dream come true—if events from the previous night weren't still so fresh on their minds, and there's that thread of fear permeating their thoughts.

They pile into the Impala as the school bus rolls by. Sam stares at it longingly, but Mary ignores it, and Dean follows her lead.

They can't stay here. Mary's not sure where she's taking them, where they're going to go next, but she knows she just has to get _away_ from here, away from this place where she almost lost Dean, where she destroyed her children's lives.

The sound of the Impala's engine rumbling is soothing in a way, like John's voice comforting her and telling her that everything will be all right in the end.

And as she shifts gears to drive, she hopes to hell that that's true.


End file.
